


Killjoys Never Die

by Roxy_palace



Category: Bandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Killjoys, Brutality, Character Death, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, Dark fic, Dustverse, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Rape, Romance, Suffering, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-11-07
Updated: 2010-11-07
Packaged: 2017-11-10 18:11:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/469186
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Roxy_palace/pseuds/Roxy_palace
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <a id="cutid1" name="cutid1"></a>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	Killjoys Never Die

Title: Killjoys Never Die  
Author: [](http://roxy-palace.livejournal.com/profile)[**roxy_palace**](http://roxy-palace.livejournal.com/)  
Pairing: Frank/Gerard  
Rating: NC 17  
Warnings: MAJOR CHARACTER DEATH. I’m not even joking – no happy endings here. You have been warned. Potentially triggering suggestions of torture and rape – all off screen. Please be warned.  
Words: 2677  
Summary:   
[](http://pics.livejournal.com/roxy_palace/pic/0000g62a/)

AN: Killjoys/Dustverse. I’m so, so, sorry for writing this, but once I thought of it I had to get it out of my head. Thank you to the ever adorable [](http://anna-unfolding.livejournal.com/profile)[**anna_unfolding**](http://anna-unfolding.livejournal.com/) for all her help and encouragement and lightening beta work. ILU, BB.

****

 

They keep him naked in a cage big enough to stand up in but not long enough to lie down in. The cage is in a room with a steel door and concrete walls. He knows they’re watching him so he doesn’t move much, he doesn’t pace. The truth is, he’s terrified; he can feel the walls closing in on him, and he can’t breathe. It’s so hot in there. There aren’t any windows.

But he doesn’t try to look beyond the door when they open it. He doesn’t want them to see him look for anything, anyone, a way out. He doesn’t want to let them see they’re getting to him.

Mikey taught him how to do that. Kid was the king of stoic.

 _Trick is to focus_. Frank remembers the things Mikey told him. _Trick is to distract yourself with facts they can’t fuck with._

So Frank sits and he recites names, dates of birth, anything he can remember – their favorite songs, flavours ice cream, the last person they kissed, the thing they missed most from before.

He recites those things like a litany.

“Michael James Way, 39,” he mutters. “Kid Kobra. Born...born... September sometime – 10 maybe? 1980. New Brunswick, New Jersey. Ah, Mikey’s favorite song is...it’s Shakespeare’s Sister...The Smiths. Yeah, the Smiths. He likes, likes ...pistachio Ice cream...he kissed. I don’t know. He kissed Gee, probably. The thing Mikey missed most...the thing he missed most was Saturday morning TV...”

Over and over and over. Sometimes he forgets and he has to make stuff up, but he doesn’t stop. He doesn’t stop.

“Frank Antony Iero, 38, aka Fun Ghoul. That is still funny. Fun Ghoul. For fuck’s sake. Born October 31, 1981 in Belleville, New Jersey. My favorite song is...today it’s Skulls. The mother fucking Misfits, man. I like...Chocolate - chocolate chip ice cream. The last person I kissed...”

He swallows. His mouth is dry.

“I miss, the thing I miss most...I am Frank Anthony Iero, and I am 36...no, 38 years old...”

Sometimes he can’t remember anything. It takes a while for stuff to come back after they’ve had him in the room.

They come every day and take there, try to make him break. And then they put him back in the cage. Sometimes they don’t even ask him any questions. Those days it’s the hardest to get the memories back.

“Gee...Gerard...Way. 31...no...Summit, NJ. Summit...”

His hands shake and his skin burns. That’s when he lets himself drift. He’ll close his eyes and pretend he’s in the Die Die Diner.

Mouse comes in and she’s found a broken zap for him to fix. That kid sure loves her weapons. “Tell me about NJ, Frankie,” she chimes. So he tells her about Belleville and High Schools she will never see and people she knows as if she met them because he’s told her this story...how many times? He can’t even count.

The memories will always keep him company until the Dracs come for him again.

They feed him once a day. Protein paste and stringy cactus guts. They push a plate of that slop through the three inch grill under the door. Sometimes, if the room particularly bad he ignores it - can’t touch it. They don’t bother to take the paperine plates away. They get piled up in the corner covering the place where he pisses and shits.

Usually the protein paste is starting to turn before they even give it to him anyway. It’s so hot in there. He can’t breathe.

“Raymond Manuel Toro Ortiz, 39. Jet Star, mother fucker. Born...born...Kearny...no, Trenton, New Jersey. New Jersey. His favorite song is...Mr fucking Crowley, Randy Rhoads...yeah...he likes vanilla. It reminds him of his...of his mom. The last girl he kissed was, Liza...no...Laura...Laura...at a swap meet. He misses...he misses his mom. Michael James...Mikeyway...Kobra...Kobra...“

The days and nights...there are no days and nights, just times when he’s conscious and times when he’s not. He wishes those times were longer than the others.

He has sores all over his body. The older ones itch. He tries not to think why the newer ones just feel numb.

Frank hears the door unlock and this time he’s on his feet in a heartbeat. Three Dracs and a suit come in; they’re only armed with night sticks and a can of Whamp which they spray straight in his face through the cage bars the second he moves.

But Frank’s been saving up for this one, biding his time. The Whamp burns like fuck, but he was already on fire. He’s so sick, so fucking, fucking sick of all of this. He hurls himself at them the second they open the cage.

The fight is brief, nasty, bloody. He takes one Drac down in the first few seconds – rips out its throat with his bare hands. He’d have gone for its guts via its asshole, but he couldn’t get there before they started raining blows down on him. Three more plow into the tiny space and he’s over powered. They bag his head and plasti cuff him, but he takes pride in the fact they have to bodily carry him out of the cell, a Drac on each limb, as he screams and writhes in their grasp.

They’re gonna have to kill him. He’s made sure they know that. They can’t break him. There’s no way. He’s going to die in this place.

The room again. Every time they bring him here he keeps expecting to see Richard Burton and head cage full of starving, demented rats.

But this isn’t 1984. This isn’t room 101.

He isn’t getting out of here.

“Frank Antony Iero, also known as Fun...Ghoul. Also known as Frankenstein.” The suit – he hasn’t seen this one before, they all try to look as bland and interchangeable as possible, but he can tell – reads from a file in the table between them. A Drac behind him pulls the bag off Frank’s head. Lights, fierce fluorescents, burn his eyes.

Frank blinks as the suit drones on flickering before him. He lets his lids slip closed in the end and pretends he’s at the diner. Mikey has just come in. He has the Trans Am’s carburettor in one hand and a screw driver in the other. “Dude,” he says. “Dude, I think there’s something wrong with the car...”

Frank laughs.

“Mr. Iero, do you find this situation funny?“ He pushes a piece of paper across the table. “This is an execution order, Mr. Iero.”

The memory of Mikey makes an exaggerated ‘whoops!’ face at Frank and rolls his eyes. Frank grins back.

“Mr. Iero, I urge you to make this easier on yourself. If you confess and repent your crimes against the state – publically repent – you will be executed humanely by firing squad. If you don’t then...well, I think you know how that goes. You’ve already lost citizen status. You’re practically cattle. You’ll be processed. Kibble, you understand?”

The suit takes a deep breath.

“Now, are you the criminal known as Fun Ghoul?”

Frank shrugs. He thinks about Ray. He thinks about Mouse. He hopes they made it to the border.

The memory of Ray is standing in the corner of the room, his hands on his hips, the mean arch of his brow visible above the mirrored glass of his aviators. He nods his head and raises a one-thumb salute. _That’s a relief_ , thinks Frank.

“Mr. Iero, can you identify this man?” The suit has put a picture on the table. What’s left of some guy, ghosted on some inner city street. It’s no one Frank knows.

Frank closes his eyes. He wishes they’d give him pants. His balls keep getting pinched by the wooden slats of the seat. It’s fucking distracting. He shakes his head.

“What about this man?” Another picture; a head, some guts, what’s left of a forearm and hand holding a burnt-out zap. He shakes his head.

“What about this man, Mr. Iero?”

Frank has never liked being called Mr. Iero. It makes him think of his dad. Worse than that, it makes him think of his granddad and that makes him sick to his stomach. It makes him want to punch shit. Which is kind of annoying, with his hands trapped in plastic behind his back and all.

He shakes his head.

A couple of seconds pass and he hears a door open on the far side of the room. He can’t stop himself from looking. He could kick himself. He knows they saw. Knows they know it’s rattled him. He hadn’t even noticed the door there.

It screeches back against the wall and they wheel something in. Long, covered in white plastic. It’s a gurney.

Frank’s surprised at how little it frightens him. A body bag on a gurney. His body bag. His gurney. _Good night, nurse._

In a lot of ways he’s relieved. The memory of Mikey pats him on the back. “See you on the other side,” he says. Frank can’t wait.

Still, he’s not gonna make it easy for them.

It takes three Dracs to get him out of his seat and drag him round the table to the gurney.

He thinks, _this is it. This is it._ He thinks, _I’ll see you on the other side. I’ll see you when I get there..._

The memory of Mikey stands just out of his view, just off to the left and back, back a bit. Frank tries not to let it go. He clings to it as long as he can.

“Mr. Iero, can you identify this man?”

A Drac leans forward and rips open the zipper of the body bag – the body bag Frank thought was for him.

Frank looks.

The bag isn’t empty like he’d thought. There’s something in the bag; stiff and starting to turn. He can smell it. That means it’s been outside - the thing in the bag - under the sun, and Frank can smell that sharp, acrid, _wrong_ smell.

His hair. Frank can see the re-growth, can see a bit he missed when he colored it last. Frank had told him fifty times to get a better mirror for that pissant fucking wash room.

But his hair, it looks redder than it would under the desert sun, against all that white plastic.

His head is tipped back, eyes closed, mouth open. Frank can just see the dry tip of his tongue behind his tiny, perfect teeth. It’s like he could be asleep. Frank keeps waiting for the tell-tale sound of his snoring and the little twitch of that pointy nose of his that always comes after.

His jacket says Dead Pegasus. Frank would laugh, but it isn’t funny.

“Mr. Iero, can you identify this body?”

Frank turns and looks at the small man in the grey flannel suit with the tinted glasses and grease slicked hair.

“No,” he says.

“Mr. Iero, I want you to look again.” A Drac grabs Frank’s head and pushes it towards the body in the bag, pushes Frank’s face into _his_ face.

“Is this the body of Gerard Way? Also known as Geeway. Also known as Party Poison. Born May 6, 1977 in Zone 19 – formerly New Jersey.”

“No.” _No_ , thinks Frank, ignoring the bile burning the back of his throat. _That_ thing _is not Gerard._

“Take another look, Mr. Iero. Is this the body of your associate, Gerard Way?”

“No,” says Frank again. He shakes his head and shrugs his shoulders. “I don’t know who that is.”

“Are you saying this is not your ...lover, Gerard Way?”

“I don’t know who that is,” says Frank. The bile starts creeping up the back of Frank’s throat, burning to get out. He swallows hard.

He looks at a patch of dried blood beneath his ear. Frank wonders how he died. He wonders if it was fast.

“Mr. Iero...” Frank fights the grin that bubbles up under his skin at the frustration in his interrogator’s voice.

“Mr. Iero, our intelligence sources inform us this is the so called _Killjoy_ , Party Poison. He was apprehended attempting to break into this building – Secure facility D. Unfortunately, he died from injuries sustained during his...arrest.”

The interrogator waits there, letting that little gem of information sink in. _Injuries sustained during his arrest._

 _At least they didn’t let the machines rape him,_ Frank thinks. _At least they didn’t take him alive._

“I understand he suffered great deal, Mr. Iero. He fought. And, according to the report, he was...very brave. Went down fighting and all that. Terrible waste. Don’t you think he deserves a proper burial? If we can’t identify him, the body will be processed. Do you understand what that means?”

Yes, Frank knows what that means. Lot of fuel in a dead body. Lot of reusable parts.

“So why don’t you help him, Frank? Why don’t you admit this is Gerard Way?”

Frank looks at the suit, twists his head as much as he can with the Drac gripping it. He looks the guy in the eye. He shakes his head.

“Because it’s not.”

The suit’s nostrils flare.

“Is this the Killjoy Gerard Way?”

“No.”

Frank shakes his head. He shakes his head. And he shakes his head.

“Frank...”

“That isn’t a Killjoy.”

The suit pinches the bridge of his nose. “It isn’t?”

“No it fucking isn’t.” Frank pushes away from the body, but the Drac’s hands are like irons bands at the back of his neck. “It can’t be, you dumb fuck.”

The interrogator laughs. “And why is that, Mr. Iero?”

The Drac pushes Frank forward for emphasis and Frank lets him, lets his face be pushed down towards the dead face. He’s so close. So close.

Then his lips touch the lips of the body in the bag, his tongue tastes the mouth, the tip of the tongue inside the mouth. It’s the merest fraction of a second. Frank doesn’t even close his eyes. He breathes deep. He remembers.

 _Gerard Arthur Way,_ he thinks, _42\. Born on April 9, 1977 in Summit, New Jersey. His favorite ice cream flavour is cherry. His favorite song is Prodigal Son, by Iron Maiden. He likes the chorus. He loves that fucking chorus. The last person he kissed was me. And he’s my last person. He’s my last person._

“Why is that Frank?”

“Because,” says Frank, pushing himself up and wrenching himself out of the Drac’s grasp. “Killjoys never die. Haven’t you heard?”

The interrogator blinks; the sneer etched on his face is so, so worth it.

“Get him out of here,” the interrogator says. “Process him. Process both of them.”

Frank has half a second to see the body again before they bag him. _I’ll see you on the other side,_ he thinks. _I’ll see you there._

He doesn’t feel afraid. They march him through the corridors, back the way they came; and when he hears a steel door open he almost thinks they’re going to put him back in the cage. He feels a little fear then. But he passes through it, and then he can feel he’s outside, feel the air on all his skin.

He’s glad it’ll be outside. Gerard died outside. So did Mikey.

They leave him standing in the open, alone. He hears them back up, five, ten...he loses count of how many paces. He hears their zaps power up.

They left the bag on his head, but he closes his eyes any way. He closes his eyes and pretends he’s back at the Die Die Diner.

Frank is sitting in the booth and Gerard walks in. He slides into the booth next to Frank; his eyes so big and warm and _Gee_. His Gee.

He runs the tip of his finger over the back of Frank’s hand and leans in.

“Time to go,” he says, soft and low in Frank’s ear. It sends a shiver down Frank’s spine. It makes him smile too. He looks at Gee.

“I’m ready,” he says and the memory of Gee smiles back.  



End file.
